All the things you need to know so that you too can be the author of your very own cookbook.
JUST KIDDING. NEVER DO THIS. IT IS AN INSANE UNDERTAKING AND WILL MAKE YOU CRAZY!!!
But if you really want to…
Gather the recipes. Organize them by category. Find a book editing program / printing service. (I use Blurb.) Decide on the layout of your book. Type up the recipes. Re-do this several times because it turns out free book editing software is not as stable as one might hope and keeps randomly crashing and screwing up formatting. Get frustrated and go to bed. Do this every night for many many many days. Find more recipes you forgot to include. Type those up. Re-order all the pages when you realize the book organization isn’t very good after you added more recipes. The program will probably crash several more times. Hopefully you’ve saved and backed up your file. Finish typing and organizing. Run spell check. Read through the entire book cover to cover, editing for any mistakes. You’ll probably miss several but do your best. Upload the book to the printing service website. Place your order well in time for a pre-Christmas delivery. Wait impatiently for the books to be delivered. Receive your order only to realize the tops of all the pages have been cut off by mistake. AHHHHH. Email and get them to run a re-print. Fix more edits you caught before you re-submit the new version for printing. Place your order and hope for the best. Fingers crossed the next printing goes better and arrives on time to be gifted for Christmas!